One Remote Venezuelan City Is Building Barricades Against Government Forces As If They Were At War

Protesters
in San Cristobal clash with a member of Venezuela's National
Guard behind scraps used as barricades and
defenses.Reuters

As protests continue in Venezuela, some regions have turned
against the government more than others. One of them is San
Cristobal, capital of the western state of Tachira. It's right on
the boarder with Colombia.

This week, authorities arrested the mayor of the city,
Daniel Ceballo, in a Caracas hotel.

"This is an act of justice for a mayor who not only did not meet
his obligations as required by law and the constitution, but also
facilitated and supported all the irrational violence in San
Cristobal," said
Justice Minister Miguel Rodriguez Torres in a television
appearance confirming the arrest.

Today, Bloomberg has a killer piece on what it's like to be in
San Cristobal. It's one of the places hardest hit by the food
shortages plaguing the country. Part of that is because residents
have built barricades to keep government forces out as
demonstrators fill the street. Those barricades keep goods from
flowing into the region.

“We’ve got to be prepared. Next time they are really coming for
us,” Mendoza, a 17-year-old student, said in front of the wall of
metal sheets, old washing machines and garbage bags. “We have to
carry on this fight until the government resigns.”...

“Bullets are flying from both sides, the fear is now real,”
Jeickson said, while standing outside a barricade rebuilt last
night after the National Guard attack in San Cristobal’s Pueblo
Nuevo.

The government fears that if a city of 700,000, like San
Cristobal, can carry on with its activities, other groups will
get inspired to do the same — groups who have traditionally stood
with the government and its Chavez legacy, like trade unions and
poor Venezuelans.

And in case you've never seen it, this is what a food line in San
Cristobal looks like.

People line up to buy food
at a supermarket in San Cristobal, about 410 miles (660 km)
southwest of Caracas, Feb. 27, 2014. U.N. Secretary-General Ban
Ki-moon and Pope Francis called on Wednesday for an end to
violence in Venezuela that has killed at least 13 people and
urged politicians to take the lead in calming the nation's worst
unrest in a decade.REUTERS/Carlos
Garcia Rawlins